A Tale of a Lonely Parish Part 42

Mr. Booley had been held in check for a few moments by Mr. Juxon's determined manner, but as he followed the squire he began to regret that he had yielded so far and he made a fresh a.s.sertion of his rights.

"I cannot see why you want to keep me outside," he said. "What difference can it make, I should like to know?"

"You will have to take my word for it that it does make a difference,"

said the doctor, testily. "If you frighten the man, he will die. Now then, here we are."

"I don't like your tone, sir," said Booley angrily, again trying to push past the physician. "I think I must insist, after all. I will go in with you--I tell you I will, sir--don't stop me."

Doctor Longstreet, who was fifteen or twenty years older than the detective but still strong and active, gripped his arm quickly, and held him back.

"If you go into that room without my permission, and if the man dies of fright, I will have an action brought against you for manslaughter," he said in a loud voice.

"And I will support it," said the squire. "I am justice of the peace here, and what is more, I am in my own house. Do not think your position will protect you."

Again Mr. Juxon's authoritative tone checked the detective, who drew back, making some angry retort which no one heard. The squire tried the door and finding it locked, knocked softly, not realising that every word of the altercation had been heard within.

"Who is there?" asked John, who though he had heard all that had been said was uncertain of the issue.

"Let in Doctor Longstreet," said the squire's voice.

But meanwhile Mrs. Ambrose and Mary G.o.ddard were standing on each side of the sick man. He must have heard the noises outside, and they conveyed some impression to his brain.

"Mary, Mary!" he groaned indistinctly. "Save me--they are coming--I cannot get away--softly, he is coming--now--I shall just catch him as he goes by--Ugh! that dog--oh! oh!--"

With a wild shriek, the wretched man sprang up, upon his knees, his eyes starting out, his face transfigured with horror. For one instant he remained thus, half-supported by the two terror-struck women; then with a groan his head drooped forward upon his breast and he fell back heavily upon the pillows, breathing still but quite unconscious.

Doctor Longstreet entered at that moment and ran to his side. But when he saw him he paused. Even Mrs. Ambrose was white with horror, and Mary G.o.ddard stood motionless, staring down at her husband, her hands gripping the disordered coverlet convulsively.

Mr. Juxon had entered, too, while Mr. Ambrose remained outside with the detective, who had been frightened into submission by the physician's last threat. The squire saw what was happening and paced the room in the greatest agitation, wringing his hands together and biting his lips. John had closed the door and came to the foot of the bed and looked at G.o.ddard's face. After a pause, Doctor Longstreet spoke.

"We might possibly restore him to consciousness for a moment--"

"Don't!" cried Mary G.o.ddard, starting as though some one had struck her.

"That is--" she added quickly, in broken tones, "unless he can live!"

"No," answered the physician, gravely, but looking hard at the unhappy woman. "He is dying."

G.o.ddard's staring eyes were glazed and white. Twice and three times he gasped for breath, and then lay quite still. It was all over. Mary gazed at his dead face for one instant, then a faint smile parted her lips: she raised one hand to her forehead as though dazed.

"He is safe now," she murmured very faintly. Her limbs relaxed suddenly, and she fell straight backwards. Charles Juxon, who was watching her, sprang forward and caught her in his arms. Then he bore her from the room, swiftly, while John Short who was as white and speechless as the rest opened the door.

"You may go in now," said Juxon as he pa.s.sed Booley and Mr. Ambrose in the pa.s.sage, with his burden in his arms. A few steps farther on he met Holmes the butler, who carried a telegram on a salver.

"For Mr. Short, sir," said the impa.s.sive servant, not appearing to notice anything strange in the fact that his master was carrying the inanimate body of Mary G.o.ddard.

"He is in there--go in," said Juxon hurriedly as he went on his way.

The detective and the vicar had already entered the room where the dead convict was lying. All stood around the bed, gazing at his pale face as he lay.

"A telegram for Mr. Short," said Holmes from the door. John started and took the despatch from the butler's hands. He hastily tore it open, glanced at the contents and thrust it into his pocket. Every one looked round.

"What is it, John?" whispered the vicar, who was nearest to him.

"Oh--nothing. I am first in the Tripos, that is all," answered John very simply, as though it were not a matter of the least consequence.

Through all those months of untiring labour, through privation and anxiety, through days of weariness and nights of study, he had looked forward to the triumph, often doubting but never despairing. But he had little guessed that the news of victory would reach him at such a moment.

It was nothing, he said; and indeed as he stood with the group of pale and awe-struck spectators by the dead man's bed, he felt that the greatest thing which had ever happened to him was as nothing compared with the tragedy of which he had witnessed the last act.

It was all over. There was nothing more to be said; the convict had escaped the law in the end, at the very moment when the hand of the law was upon him. Thomas Reid, the conservative s.e.xton, buried him "four by six by two," grumbling at the parish depth as of yore, and a simple stone cross marked his nameless grave. There it stands to this day in the churchyard of Billingsfield, Ess.e.x, in the shadow of the ancient abbey.

All these things happened a long time ago, according to Billingsfield reckoning, but the story of the tramp who attacked Squire Juxon and was pulled down by the bloodhound is still told by the villagers, and Mr.

Gall, being once in good cheer, vaguely hinted that he knew who the tramp was; but from the singular reticence he has always shown in the matter, and from the prosperity which has attended his constabulary career, it may well be believed that he has a life interest in keeping his counsel.

Indeed as it is nearly ten years since Mr. Reid buried the poor tramp, it is possible that Mr. Gall's memory may be already failing in regard to events which occurred at so remote a date.

It was but an incident, though it was perhaps the only incident of any interest which ever occurred in Billingsfield; but until it reached its termination it agitated the lives of the quiet people at the vicarage, at the cottage and at the Hall as violently as human nature can be moved.

It was long, too, before those who had witnessed the scene of G.o.ddard's death could shake off the impression of those awful last moments. Yet time does all things wonderful and in the course of not many months there remained of G.o.ddard's memory only a great sense of relief that he was no longer alive. Mary G.o.ddard, indeed, was very ill for a long time; and but for Mrs. Ambrose's tender care of her, might have followed her husband within a few weeks of his death. But the good lady never left her, until she was herself again--absolutely herself, saving that as time pa.s.sed and her deep wounds healed her sorrows were forgotten, and she seemed to bloom out into a second youth.

So it came to pa.s.s that within two years Charles Juxon once more asked her to be his wife. She hesitated long--fully half an hour, the squire thought; but in the end she put out her small hand and laid it in his, and thanked G.o.d that a man so generous and true, and whom she so honestly loved, was to be her husband as well as her friend and protector. Charles James Juxon smoothed his hair with his other hand, and his blue eyes were a little moistened.

"G.o.d bless you, Mary," he said; and that was all.

Then the Reverend Augustin Ambrose married them in the church of Saint Mary's, between Christmas and New Year's Day; and the wedding-party consisted of Mrs. Ambrose and Eleanor G.o.ddard and John Short, Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. And again years pa.s.sed by, and Nellie grew in beauty as John grew in reputation; and Nellie had both brothers and sisters, as she had longed to have, and to her, their father was as her own; so that there was much harmony and peace and goodwill towards men in Billingsfield Hall. John came often and stayed long, and was ever welcome; for though Mary G.o.ddard's youth returned with the daffodils and the roses of the first spring after Walter's death, John's fleeting pa.s.sion returned not, and perhaps its place was better taken. Year by year, as he came to refresh himself from hard work with a breath of the country air, he saw the little girl grow to the young maiden of sixteen, and he saw her beauty ripen again to the fulness of womanhood; and at last, when she was one and twenty years of age he in his turn put out his hand and asked her to take him--which she did, for better or worse, but to all appearances for better. For John Short had prospered mightily in the world, and had come to think his first great success as very small and insignificant as compared with what he had done since. But his old simplicity was in him yet, and was the cause of much of his prosperity, as it generally is when it is found together with plenty of brains. It was doubtless because he was so very simple that when he found that he loved Eleanor G.o.ddard he did not hesitate to ask the convict's daughter to be his wife. His interview with Mr. Juxon was characteristic.

"You know what you are doing, John?" asked the squire. He always called him John, now.

"Perfectly," replied the scholar, "I am doing precisely what my betters have done before me with such admirable result."

"Betters?"

"You. You knew about it all and you married her mother. I know all about it, and I wish to marry herself."

"You know that she never heard the story?"

"Yes. She never shall."

"No, John--she never must. Well, all good go with you."

So Charles Juxon gave his consent. And Mary Juxon consented too; but for the first time in many years the tears rose again to her eyes, and she laid her hand on John's arm, as they walked together in the park.

"Oh, John," she said, "do you think it is right--for you yourself?"

"Of course I think so," quoth John stoutly.

"You John--with your reputation, your success, with the whole world at your feet--you ought not to marry the daughter of--of such a man."

"My dear Mrs. Juxon," said John Short, "is she not your daughter as well as his? Pray, pray do not mention that objection. I a.s.sure you I have thought it all over. There is really nothing more to be said, which I have not said to myself. Dear Mrs. Juxon--do say Yes!"

"You are very generous, John, as well as great," she answered looking up to his face. "Well--I have nothing to say. You must do as you think best.

I am sure you will be kind to Nellie, for I have known you for ten years--you may tell her I am very glad--" she stopped, her eyes br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with tears.